Loved Alone
Kimberli Pelo Robison

One cold, but brilliant, winter afternoon I went ice-skating with my seven-year-old, Sarah. She’d been learning how to ice-skate at school and I promised I would go skating with her, just her and me. It had been years since I’d been on the ice and my skates were a little tight, but none of that mattered once we were out on the ice. We wobbled around the rink together holding hands and laughing as we nearly pulled each other down time and again.

After awhile Sarah sat down on the ice and watched me as I practiced skating backwards. I looked over at her and smiled. She scrambled to her feet, skated over and gave me a tight hug. “I love you, Mom,” she said. A couple minutes later she came back and gave me another hug and told me, “We should never let go of love.”

She must have been feeling what I was feeling. Just being with her all alone reminded me how much I love her too — how much I love her smile, her freckles, her thoughtful expressions, her exuberance and excitement for life. At one point she asked, “Aren’t you thankful that I got you to come out here with me, so you could remember what it’s like to be a kid?” I was thankful and amazed that I hadn’t done it sooner.

It took that afternoon with Sarah to remind me how important it is to make the effort to be alone with those we love. We have lots of fun as a family, but when I’m just with one child or alone with my husband I can focus in on that one person in a way I simply can’t do when we’re all together. There is a completely different feeling between us, a tenderness of love that binds our hearts together.

Part of a Whole?

Being part of something bigger than us, such as a marriage, a family or a ward, is wonderful and fulfilling. Then there are times I feel I've become so much a part of something else that I have completely lost sight of my own uniqueness. Am I just a part of a whole, or am I whole, irrespective of my part?

A while ago when I went to the temple I was thinking about this. I wanted to know how a woman like me could come to know God. Would I get to know him personally or would I have to go through someone else?

As I moved through the session I was struck again and again with how the Lord meets us individually. I moved through with a group, but along the way I covenanted and received gifts individually, on my own. Best of all, I came to the Lord alone, just Him and me. No one in between, no group effort, just me alone.

Feeling loved as an individual makes all the difference in the world. I don't want to abandon the groups I am part of. They fill my life with meaning and purpose. They fill my life with love, but when I know I am good enough all alone my life is filled with peace.

Personal God, Too

I love this scripture in Moses. It speaks to me of how my Father in Heaven can be a God of the universe and yet a personal God too. "For behold, there are many worlds that have passed away by the word of my power. And there are many that now stand, and innumerable are they unto man; but all things are numbered unto me, for they are mine and I know them (Moses 1:35)."

He knows me! I am his! He may rule worlds without number, but he knows me. And what's more, he loves me. It changes my life. I don't have to worry about keeping up with anyone else. I don't have to be everything. I have a Father who lets me approach him personally, a God who leads me individually, a Savior who loves me alone.

We all long to be loved alone, don’t we? Sarah felt it that day on the ice in the winter sunshine. I felt it as I went through the temple, loved all alone. We both felt loved just for whoever we were, not because we were part of something, but because we belonged to someone who loves us deeply. Yet, I could only feel and extend that love when I sought it through nurturing a relationship with one on one time.

“Draw near unto me and I will draw near unto you,” invites the Lord and through perfect example He shows us that he means it. When Jesus appeared to the Nephites he encouraged and allowed them to meet him one by one. "And this they did do, going forth one by one until they had all gone forth, and did see with their eyes and did feel with their hands, and did know of a surety and did bear record, that it was he, of whom it was written by the prophets, that should come (3 Nephi 11:15)." It wasn't enough for them to see him as a group; it had to be a personal meeting, a personal witness.

Later, when the Savior asked the multitude to bring their little ones to him, "He took (them) one by one, and blessed them, and prayed unto the Father for them." Then as a further show of compassion for these little ones and their need for individual attention "angels (descended) out of heaven as it were in the midst of fire; and they came down and encircled those little ones about . . . and the angels did minister unto them (3 Nephi 17:21, 24)." This is His way. The Lord and his angels can and do minister to us individually, because we matter to Him, individually.

Alone Time

My children matter to me individually too and they seek that kind of love from me all the time. I don’t do it perfectly, but when I spend time alone with them they are happier, more secure and more at peace. Isn't it the same for us? When I spend time alone with the Lord I am happier, more secure and more at peace. My motives are purer and my compassion flows more freely.

President Kimball put it this way, "I find that when I get casual in my relationships with divinity and when it seems that no divine ear is listening and no divine voice is speaking, that I am far, far away. If I immerse myself in the scriptures the distance narrows and the spirituality returns. I find myself loving more intensely those whom I must love with all my heart and mind and strength, and loving them more, I find it easier to abide their counsel (The Teachings of Spencer W. Kimball, p.135)."

This magnification of love works in our relationship with the Lord and in our relationships with our children. It is always amazing to me the change that comes over a child with whom I have spent some time alone. It is just as President Kimball says it is for him when he closes the gap between himself and his Heavenly Father. When I have bridged the emotional space between my child and me they seem to “love more intensely” and “find it easier to abide (my) counsel.”

It’s no wonder the Lord bids us to come to him again and again. He knows that it is in being close to Him that we will feel his love and love him in return. I am striving to be like Him and in so doing I hope to help my children feel the kind of love I feel from Him. A love that says, “Despite the fact that I have dishes in the sink, piles of laundry on the floor, meals to be made and an eternal round of things to do, you are mine and I know you.”

They may not feel it all the time, but on those special days when we are just with one another we can remember what Sarah stated so perfectly, “We should never let go of love.”